Nissa Van Riper
ABOUT ME
The Page Only My Mom Will Read
How far back?
Well. I flailed about.
Lexington, Indianapolis, Chicago.
A late bloomer.
​
Kalamazoo.
A degree, eventually.
Refusing perfectly apropos advice
from perfectly qualified people
I did not pursue a career in writing.
Instead, residential construction and design.
And then I built my life
in the "seven hills"and infinite exquisiteness of
San Francisco.
Puzzle piece, fitted.
Soon enough, the impossible proved possible.
I loved a man more than
I loved the city.
Now I share his itinerant ways.
Kansas City, DC, Joshua Tree, Orange County.
St Louis, Central PA, Tampa Bay.
Stuttgart.
Moving has taught me
many things about myself, about people.
Motherhood, too, has shaped me.
And so has this insatiable world.
Currently York. Which is simultaneously
everything and nothing as I'd imagined.
Life is surprising and challenging and precious and good and right.
And if it's not, I can remake it.
That is the beautiful thing.
Play is the work of childhood.
Jean Piage
WHY I WRITE, AND FOR WHOM
A line crafted with nuance and precision will stop your heart.
Language is a playground. Considering, combining.
It is other things, too: challenging, frustrating, confronting.
Carefully tended, writing is wonderfully wonderous.
​
The world overestimates children's resiliency and underestimates their understanding.
These are things kids deserve to be: included, considered, unscheduled. Hopeful.
And things they do not: rushed, pushed, tricked. Pacified.
Growing up is hard enough.
Let them fall in love with a story.
For the littlest:
Gentle and goofy, un-message-y, straightforward stories with simple and
powerful devices like repetition, imagery, alliteration and rhyme.
Tell stories that kids will clutch and clamor for. On repeat.
Enchant them.
For grade-schoolers, administer hearty doses of wonder, wild and whimsy.
Gasps, giggles, groans.
And how great if books can provoke new perspectives!
Charm them.
Middle graders wrestle growing anxieties, and yet
remain childlike, open, imaginative.
In the place between
naive and knowing.
Build a bridge between their two worlds.
And without a doubt, entertain them.
For young adults stories can be a balm.
But they are ˚˖‧✧*.‧m a g i c .˖‧✧*˖ first, remember.
Invite them in.
"If you're a pretender come sit by my fire
for we have some flax-golden tales to spin..."
-- (all hail) Shel Silverstein
Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators member.
scbwi.org
